By the Drobe news desk

A new RISC OS MSN chat client was released for free tonight for brave punters to test drive. Dubbed Parmesan by developer Christian Ludlam, the software allows people to chat to each other in real-time over the Internet - ideally enabling RISC OS punters to converse with buddies using Windows, Linux, Mac OS X and other computer platforms.

In a covert announcement earlier this evening, Christian said: "I'm looking for beta testers to trial a new MSN client I've written for RISC OS. If you have an MSN account, please try it."

Although the freeware software, pictured, gets stuck at the "Setting online status" point on drobe's RISC OS 4.42-powered A9home, the client at least reportedly works on a vanilla RISC OS 4 RiscPC and a RISC OS 5 Iyonix. Christian's client even supports nudges, allowing online chatterboxes to wobble the other person's Parmesan windows to grab their attention.

Continues here: »www.drobe.co.uk/riscos/artifact2052.html